


That Time with the Goats

by Niitza



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Animal Death, Crack, F/M, Goats, M/M, Magic, Mjolnir - Freeform, Norse Mythology - Freeform, Only not quite, POV Clint Barton, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Probably Not The Avengers: Infinity War (Movie) Compliant, Steve Rogers as Nomad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-11
Updated: 2016-06-11
Packaged: 2018-07-14 11:40:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,627
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7169549
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Niitza/pseuds/Niitza
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>"This is Tanngrisnir," Thor says, his right hand settling on one of the goats' huge, dangerously angular horns, "and this is Tanngnjóstr."</i><br/><i>"Gesundheit," Tony says.</i><br/><i>Clint is now close enough to try petting one of the goats. It almost bites his fingers off.</i><br/> </p><p>Or: a myth from the <i>Prose Edda</i>, rewritten Avengers-style.</p>
            </blockquote>





	That Time with the Goats

**Author's Note:**

> Because surely I'm not the only one who sometimes wishes Marvel would include more elements from actual Norse mythology in their movies and give us Thor riding a chariot drawn by freaking goats instead of trying to be fancy.

If Clint were being honest, he would tell you that after the whole Sokovia Accords fiasco, he fully expected for the Avengers Initiative to be over and done with, and for himself to get to enjoy his renewed retirement.

If Clint were being honest, he would agree with you that sometimes, he is very naive—or very stupid.

Because _as if_. As if the universe would ever cut him that much slack. And he isn't talking about the whole prison break thing that led to his trial being held in absentia and more concretely to him ending up on the Most Wanted list in at least 117 countries, no. That would've been too easy to deal with. No, he's talking about the Universe with a capital U, screwing him—and everyone else—over by spitting out a megalomaniac alien (another one!) quite determined to enslave the good old Milky Way and reduce any resistance to stardust.

Seriously. Why was Clint even surprised when he heard. Why was he surprised when suddenly his status of fugitive and outlaw was internationally revoked and the governments of the world started spouting lyrics about forgiveness and extenuating circumstances and, as a whole, failed spectacularly at pretending they weren't begging for the Avengers to step up to the plate and save the world (again). And why was he surprised that not only he, but also Cap (or, he guesses, Ex-Cap) and Sam and Wanda and Scott and Bruce and Natasha all came out of the woodworks to fight the good fight like the heroes—read: dumbasses—they are.

Even Former-Cap's buddy Barnes is here and last Clint heard, he was chilling (literally) in a lab in Wakanda.

It's a bit strange, for them to be all together again. Strange, but also quite nice. After all, it's not like Clint had many occasions, or the means, to check up on his former teammates while he was laying low. All he got was, from time to time, a small update from Natasha about her wellbeing—but never on her location, and even though he trusted her messages to be safe and untraceable, he trusted their content less.

It looks like she wasn't lying, though: she looks good, her hair back to the fiery red he's familiar with, but of such a length that it can't be natural (Clint never knows; in his eyes Natasha's ever changing hairdo is one of her superpowers, because he has no idea how she does that). She's used to staying off the radar, much like Scott, who is doing so well he even found himself a girlfriend, who introduced herself as Hope. By contrast, Sam and Bruce both look worse for wear. Clearly the fugitive diet and lifestyle isn't doing it for them.

Wanda for her part seems older, the wariness she'd started to lose during her time with the Avengers dialed back up to maximum levels. She clearly gravitates towards Not-A-Cap-Anymore and, curiously, towards Barnes—although that might be a false impression, born from the fact that the two senior citizens rarely stand more than three feet apart. Clint is pretty sure he's seen them hold hands on more than one occasion, when one hadn't an arm thrown over the other's shoulders or waist. Which is disturbing. But not as much as the outfit Stop-Calling-Me-Cap-Clint is wearing, a suit oddly reminiscent of his S.H.I.E.L.D. stealth uniform, all in dark blues but with a freaking cape in pale earth tones. It makes him as glaringly obvious a target as his shield used to, unless he's spent the last two years in the desert or something.

(Suddenly, the absurdly numerous difficulties that the extremist groups in the Near and Middle East have been encountering start making a whole lot more sense.)

So yes, it's nice to see them all again and to kick ass together with no delicate question like the Accords cramping their style. It doesn't mean that there isn't any leftover tension, though. Clint doesn't know what transpired in Siberia, what exactly made What-Should-I-Call-You-Then throw his shield at Stark's face and leave; he just gathered that it had to do with Barnes—and some of it lingers, a weird vibe humming between Barnes and Stark.

At the same time, it might be due to the brand new arm that Barnes is sporting, courtesy of Wakanda's science and riches, and that he showed off to Wilson and Wanda and even Peter but definitely didn't let Stark see up close. Clint isn't quite sure how or why T'Challa went from trying to rip Barnes' face off to gifting him with a piece of technology worth billions, but he's quite sure that Stark is vexed that he hasn't been granted the smallest of peeks.

Anyway, whatever the reason for their mutual circumspection, somehow Call-Me-Steve always finds himself standing between the two of them, acting like the shield he isn't carrying anymore. Clint wonders if he is aware of it.

Wanda steers clear of Stark too, although she makes sure to glare at him once every five minutes at least. Obviously, she's blaming him for letting Vision get captured by the current Big Bad.

Fortunately, the others help counteract all that. Clint is grateful for Natasha's presence, for Bruce's return, for Wilson's no-nonsense pragmatism and for T'Challa's kingly calm. Hell, he's even grateful for Peter's babbling, even though he has no idea why the kid is here. He just turned up at the rendezvous point and, well, quite effectively _glued_ himself to the jet until they allowed him to tag along.

Their mission, or their objective, was to take the Quinjet to meet up with some Starguy from outer space (how is this Clint's life again?), who seems to know Things about the infinity stones, who claims that he wants to help and who has been in contact with Stark.

(Per phone. Which begs question of how the guy got Stark's number. Surely Tony's ego isn't big and loud enough to be seen and heard from beyond the Solar system, is it?)

So they were headed for the North Pole—okay, not _exactly_ the North Pole, but still, _way_ too far up north for Clint to be happy about it and not ask repeatedly why their missions never led them to the Bahamas—when they were attacked and the Quinjet unceremoniously shot down. And the fact that they disposed of their assailants without breaking a sweat, while a fine and vengeful consolation confirming how aptly their team is named, doesn't change a thing about the situation it propelled them into: stranded somewhere in Northern Europe, trudging through an endless pine forest and a one foot deep blanket of snow. Night is falling, because they're on the wrong side of fall (why can't bad guys attack in summer like civilized people?) and days are like two minutes long in these parts.

Clint doesn't even know where they are exactly. Russia? Norway? He would ask Natasha, but he knows all she'll do is stare at him for a whole minute, then say something in Russian, of which he'll only catch the word "American" and know it was extremely insulting for both him and his countrymen. He could ask Barnes, he guesses, but the man looks positively grumpy. And he has, you know, a metal arm, which Clint has seen in action both against (now dead) aliens and Wilson, who has developed a death wish and keeps _prodding_ at him whenever he gets the chance.

It's too bad, because Clint suspects he and Barnes really could get along. Especially when the man grumbles: "I thought one of the perks of falling off that fucking train meant that at least I was done with this shit."

Clint totally agrees: jumping off a train definitely sounds better than the stomping they're doing now. I-Can't-Call-You- _Steve_ -Cap, on the other hand, doesn't, and throws Barnes one of his Wide-Eyed Looks Of Utter Hurt™.

"Oh," Barnes says. "Too soon?"

"Well," Call-Me-Nomad-Then replies wetly, " _yeah_."

Barnes lets out a small sound and—yep, here comes another half hug, Barnes throwing an arm around Nomad-Cap's shoulders and squishing him against his side like the guy isn't over six feet tall. Somehow they don't stumble.

To make matters worse, clouds have been gathering overhead, hiding what little light they were getting from the fading sun. Soon enough, it looks like night has already fallen and a low growl of thunder rumbles over them.

It makes Clint think of Thor. They could definitely use the god's help right about now, and his mighty hammer swing. But they haven't heard anything from him; they don't know if he's even aware of what's happening. According to Jane Forster, the Rainbow Road he used to go from his planet to Earth and back is broken, and all communication has been interrupted.

Which sucks. Majorly.

"My friends!"

Clint is so focused on how much the Universe has screwed them over and will probably keep screwing them over for as long as it pleases that it takes several seconds for the voice to register. When it does, he pauses and looks up—and sees Thor, for it is him indeed, barreling down towards them on a ridiculously tiny golden chariot drawn by—

"I have found you," Thor booms once the chariot has landed, weaving smoothly between the trees until it stops in front of them.

No one replies. They're all too busy staring at the two goats pulling the carriage.

Goats.

Not-Nomad-Cap-Just-Nomad is the first one to recover and joyfully walk over. Thor greets him with a happy "friend Steve!" and an even happier smile when Nomad-the-Just introduces Barnes to him.

The rest of the team approaches, warily looking at the goats.

"Are those sheep?" Stark finally asks, because he might be a genius but he's worse than John Snow and doesn't know anything about the real world.

Thor glances over from where he'd been heartily shaking hands with T'Challa, clearly delighted to _finally_ meet Earth royalty. "I see that you have noticed my carriage," he says. "Given the state of the Bifröst, it was the only way I could travel to reach you. This is Tanngrisnir," he adds, his right hand settling on one of the goats' huge, dangerously angular horns, "and this is Tanngnjóstr."

"Gesundheit," Tony says.

Clint is now close enough to try petting one of the goats. It almost bites his fingers off.

"I have come to fight this war with you," Thor says, apparently not caring about his nasty pets maiming his teammates. "I have studied the many scrolls and manuscripts about the stones which were gathered in the palace, before it burned. I can be of help."

Clint isn't convinced that they need Thor for his _brains_ , but whatever. Given the current situation, he's not going to look a gift horse in the mouth.

Or a gift goat.

Jesus.

 

*

 

They keep on plodding through pine trees and snow. All too soon, night falls entirely and they end up surrounded by a darkness so thick and deep that even their Stark Industries flashlights don't prevent them from tripping. The third time Scott walks right into a tree, they decide it's time to set up camp.

It's easy enough to find a clearing with a rocky outcropping shielding them from the wind whispering through the forest and to find enough wood to build a fire. But once that is done and they've all sat down, there's nothing to distract them from how tired and most of all how hungry they all are.

They have nothing to eat. After all, it's not like they had the time to grab any rations in between strapping on parachutes and throwing themselves off the jet before it crashed.

At least there is plenty of ice water they can melt for drinking.

"Should someone try and hunt something?" Natasha asks, the only one among them always brave enough to ask the difficult questions.

" _Is_ there something to hunt around here?" Stark questions at once. "Wait, polar bears. Or do you mean wolves? I'm not eating wolf, just so you know."

"We haven't come across any animal trail that wasn't at least three days old since we've landed," Barnes says from where he's sitting, right beside Let's-Go-With-Rogers and wrapped with him in his cape. "Whatever lives in these parts, they're staying as far away from us as they can." A small, dark smile curves his lips. "Not that I blame them."

"Fear not, my friends!" Thor exclaims. "For I have everything we need."

He heads for his tiny chariot, beside which his two goats are still standing even though he's unhitched them as soon as they stopped. Clint expects him to open some sort of magical secret compartment and pull out entire bags of provisions—secretly he hopes there'll be a roasted chicken in the mix. What he _doesn't_ expect is for Thor to coax his goats forward with pats on their heads and necks—they don't try and bite off _his_ fingers, Clint notices grumpily—then raise the axe attached to his belt and… decapitate them, in two neat swings. Chop, chop.

Peter squeaks in horror. Wanda's gasp is more controlled but still clearly audible. The rest of the Avengers stare.

Blood gushes.

Paying his teammates no heed, Thor takes the cauldron hanging off the side of his chariot like he had this all planned from the start, fills it with snow and goes to hang it over the fire. Then he goes back to his goats—his very _dead_ goats—and starts preparing them: making sure they've bled out, skinning them, disemboweling them, hacking them into pieces that he throws into the pot, which by then has started boiling.

During all of this, he is humming. And he keeps humming while he pulls a couple of jars as well as a bunch of bowls and spoons out of his chariot—so there is a magical secret compartment!—, sits back down beside the pot, sprinkles it with his various spices and stirs until it's done, about an hour later.

He doesn't seem to notice his teammates staring at him in mute, half-disgusted fascination the whole time.

"Eat, my friends," he simply says when he starts ladling the ragout into bowls and handing them around, "for the flesh is good and rich, and you will all need your strength. Just be careful not to break the bones, please."

Clint wonders how decapitating and eating your pet goats is okay but damaging the bones while you're at it is, like, desecration—but he still accepts his own bowl with a solemn nod.

Once everyone is served, there is a pregnant pause.

Rogers and Barnes are the first to buckle down and start eating, because they're polite like that—or rather, because they come from those barbaric times where kids were taught early on to butcher and skin the rabbit they were lovingly petting that very morning. Or where rationing meant that you had to resort to eating cats if you didn't want to starve. Clint doesn't know. Clint doesn't _want_ to know.

Natasha follows suit because that's definitely the kind of fucked up shit the Red Room would've raised her to believe is, like, normal. She eats in small, controlled bites.

Sam does the same, because, well. He's been in the army, he's probably had worse at one point or another. He doesn't look happy about it, though. Much to the contrary. Clint can see it on his face, actually: the dawning realization, the emerging memory of one of the main reasons why he decided to quit in the first place. The reason he'd _forgotten_ , because humans are stupid and fickle like that. But now, oh, now he remembers. He realizes how naive he's been, how complacent, how oblivious. He realizes that he's been had, fooled by Captain America's heroic jawline and clear blue gaze of justice into getting back into the fray, and suffering the plight of bad food everywhere as a consequence. Clint feels for him. He really does.

"I— I'm a vegan?" Bruce stammers, looking a bit green around the edges—not in a good way, but not in the _worst_ way either, fortunately.

Even greener is Peter, who might or might not be ready to cry or throw up any second. He's from Queens, Clint remembers, he probably never stopped to think about where exactly his steaks came from, or that milk probably isn't chemically produced in labs and factories.

Wanda for her part is simply pale, but she tentatively digs into her portion, probably because she comes from a poor Eastern European country still collectively traumatized by the empty shelves in grocery stores under the Soviet rule and has been raised to never waste any food ever.

Scott and Hope don't have the same qualms: they're already halfway through their bowls. But at the same time, Clint is pretty convinced they're both half ants by now and don't these, like, eat their fallen comrades? Gross.

In between mouthfuls, T'Challa has struck up a conversation with Thor about sacrificial meals and spices, because apparently that's what kings do.

And then there is Tony, who tentatively nudges his ragout with his spoon until he decides that it looks different enough from the—now former—goats for him to consider it another thing entirely and starts eating with gusto.

Clint looks down at his own bowl. _Come on_ , he thinks. _You live on a farm. You do this all the time_. Except he doesn't: mostly they grow corn and vegetables there, the only animals they have are some hens they keep for their morning eggs, and they sure don't eat them. Or do they?

Suddenly he remembers noticing that the cute plump red chick—his favorite—was missing shortly before the universe announced it was about to go to hell, and now that he thinks about it they did have that delicious roasted chicken two Sundays ago. Except that Laura wouldn't do that. Or at least, not without telling him. Would she?

 _Aw man_ , he thinks, and feels betrayed.

 _Is it what they mean when they ask about grounds for divorce_ , is his first thought.

 _No_ , he amends almost at once. _Come on, Hawkeye, you're stronger than that. Emulate your spirit animal or some crap. You're a predator. You're a carnivore. You hunt and eat rabbits for fun_. Full of that voracious determination, he puts the spoonful of goat ragout into his mouth.

It tastes like eating his dog Lucky would, he's sure.

 

*

 

Clint's pretty certain that no one sleeps well that night. Well, except for Thor, who snores loudly enough for the branches and needles overhead to rustle. And for Rogers and Barnes, who clearly realized that Thor was on to something with his cape and look all warm and cozy wrapped in the one they added to Nomad-the-Just's outfit—and around each other. Assholes.

Of the rest of them, only T'Challa doesn't seem to be affected by the cold. He's regally lying on his back with his hands interlaced like he and his illustrious Wakandan ancestors invented the posture and the pharaohs were nothing but amateurs and pale imitators. Everyone else is shivering, no matter how close to each other they huddle. The freezing cold is made worse by the meat weighing down on their stomachs, a heavy and icy lump of guilt and leftover horror.

Clint has slept in worst conditions, of course. Yet he keeps startling awake. Every time, he could swear he just heard a goat, bleating.

 

*

 

The following morning everyone is half-dead, half-frozen, except for the assholes who actually slept. Thor goes from deeply asleep to cheerfully awake in about a second and jumps up at once. Out of the geriatric duo Rogers is the first to emerge and he fucking _kisses Barnes awake_ , like it's something you _do_. (It's _not_ —not when the world is ending, not when you used to be America's greatest soldier and the world's greatest assassin, not when _Clint_ doesn't get to be tenderly waken up by the love of his life and look all mellow and mushy and _cute_ while they're at it, _ugh_.)

T'Challa looks effortlessly immaculate and princely, which, unfair.

Dragging himself and stumbling like a zombie, Bruce went and scraped some bark off a young pine tree, which he is now boiling in water to make an ersatz morning coffee, he says. Clint is not convinced, but he would kill for something warm right now, so he agrees to try it.

It tastes, of course, like shit. An expresso so strong it's almost solid would be disgustingly sweet in comparison.

"Reminds me of Italy," Barnes mutters to Rogers with that small, dark smile Clint is growing familiar with and is starting to suspect is not, actually, a leftover from the Winter Soldier, but an echo of something—someone?—much older than that. Roger nods, and looks nostalgic.

Tony for his part doesn't seem to notice the difference. He has that vacant look in his eyes which they all know and dread. After a whole night of complaining about how uncomfortable the suit is, he's probably brainstorming ideas about updating it with a night mode, complete with memory foam mattress, toasty warm woolen blanket and 5K thread count sheets.

Natasha, who is quite determined not to die of a not-coffeine-induced aneurism just yet and is just smarter than the rest of them (especially Clint), declines the offer of a drink in favor of stretching. Wanda follows suit. Clint knows he probably should do the same, but he's not that strong or disciplined. He consoles himself by watching the reactions of the rest of the team to Bruce's awful concoction.

A sip has Thor beaming and booming that it reminds him of an Asgardian infusion (of course). T'Challa has a taste and agrees that it 'has character', which makes Clint decide he'll never try any traditional Wakandan drink offered to him ever. Sam, making a fine imitation of a caveman, is grimacing at his bowl, clearly hesitating between giving it a try and 'accidentally' spilling it all. Peter is off to the side, heaving behind a tree. Scott doesn't have an opinion, since after squirming and turning and whining for two thirds of the night he's now sleeping like a log. Hope is quite obviously getting ready to kick him awake.

Clint takes another sip, sullen. It still tastes like shit.

Once he's swallowed down two bowls of sludge, Thor gets up and heads over to where he told them to put his goats' bones the night previous, piled on top of their spread skins. Clint watches, intrigued, as the god starts rummaging through the heap (and seriously, it's too early for this), picking up one bone after the other and disposing them like he's trying to piece both skeletons back together.

 _Is it another one of those weird-ass Asgardian rituals?_ Clint blearily wonders when Thor straightens back up, looking down at his handiwork with a satisfied smile on his lips. He gets some sort of confirmation when the god raises his hammer over both cadavers and says something in his weird mother tongue, which Clint doesn't understand but which sure sounds like a blessing.

"Holy fuck!" he can't help but exclaim a second later, because between one blink and the next the morbid picture of bones and skins laid out to dry has disappeared to be replaced by, well, the goats—as in, the _living_ goats, who pick themselves up like they weren't dead and eaten not one second earlier. They crowd around Thor, lovingly bleating at him to be petted, like he didn't mercilessly slaughter them and fucking ate them less than twelve hours ago.

By then everyone is staring (again). Even T'Challa looks mildly surprised, which Clint didn't think was possible.

Thor doesn't seem to notice. He leads his goats to the chariot, probably to hitch them up again—but he pauses and frowns, because one of the goats is quite obviously limping. Thor kneels down and tenderly takes the offending leg in one of his massive paws, gently feeling alongside it until he finds something and stops. His frown deepens. He carefully puts the leg back down and turns towards his teammates.

His suspicious glare goes from one face to the next, and settles on Stark. For a second Stark freezes, looking for all the world like a kid who's been caught with his hand in the cookie jar. Then he covers it up with the usual nonchalance. Or tries to.

"Stark," Thor growls as he stands up.

"Me?" Stark replies, probably meaning to sound flippant but missing by a mile.

"I told you not to break the bones," Thor growls on.

And okay, this you have to hand to Stark: he always owns up to his shit. Kind of.

"Ex _cuse_ me," he says, "I didn't _break_ it. I cut it." His bravado falters since Thor is now advancing on him, bringing back several painful memories, no doubt. "I was very careful, I swear," he babbles, raising his hands in a placating gesture. "And I put both pieces back together afterwards, no one saw the difference, not even you."

"I do not appreciate you using Tanngnjóstr for yet another one of your dubious experiments," Thor spits, now looming.

"Okay, no, it wasn't an _experiment_. I was eating, okay?" When all he gets in return is a skeptical look, he puffs up and declares haughtily: "Bone marrow is a delicacy, you know."

His attitude and tone almost earn him a point on the scoreboard—only he destroys all that effort by squeaking when Thor raises his hammer right in front of his face.

"This is why you are not worthy of Mjölnir," the god states. He glares at Stark for another second or two, then turns away with a dramatic whirl of his cape, having delivered what he probably considers the most damning judgment possible.

Unfortunately, Tony Stark never knows 1. how to admit defeat, 2. how to accept not having the last word, 3. how to keep his mouth shut. "Hey, it's your fault for not being clear enough," he protests. "Just so you know, I'm definitely _not_ hiring you to translate any of my instruction manuals when Stark Industries expands to Asgard."

Thor whirls back on him.

And thus the Avengers find out that Mjölnir is, indeed, mightier than the suit.

Barnes watches the curve Stark describes in the air before he crashes with the appreciation of a true expert in ballistics, then beams at Thor—which makes Rogers beam in turn. Wanda looks at the god with renewed interest. Natasha and T'Challa don't bother to hold back a smirk. Scott and Hope clap, gamely playing the peanut gallery. Wilson remains impassive—or he might have gone into shock after trying Bruce's eco-friendly liquid tar. Only Peter looks distressed and vaults over to make sure Stark's okay (like they didn't all see the retro-propulsors of his suit cushion his fall, duh). Bruce follows at a more sedate pace, unworried.

Sure enough, a second later Stark is batting Peter's hands away, claiming that he's alright, of _course_ he is, he is wearing a piece of the most advanced armor technology in the whole _universe_ , seriously, who does Peter think he _is_?

And for some reason, in that small moment of fucked-up companionship shared with this group of deranged people (and two goats who could give Jesus a run for his money) while they're all stranded in the middle of the taiga, Clint is suddenly convinced that everything is going to be okay. Suddenly he believes that they might just win this thing—and maybe even survive.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading :) Here is [the tumblr post](http://princessniitza.tumblr.com/post/145769363181/fic-that-time-with-the-goats) if you feel like reblogging.


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